The rain now dictates what I might do. There are two options. Stay at home or go to work. My life may now be complicated, but my flow chart is uncomplicated. It rained, so today I went to work. I am not complaining because I have a basis for comparison – others have children, and therefore competing responsibilities.

When I was a child (yawn) my comings and goings were not monitored. So I suppose my parents also had uncomplicated flow charts. They did not have to take me anywhere – if I wanted to go someplace, I went myself. I got there by bicycle, bus, and foot.

Surplus newspaper boxes

Was it a good childhood? I do wish that in the summer months I’d been more intellectually challenged. I also recall that during my high school years my sister, mother, and I lived in a one bedroom apartment, with my sister and I sharing a single room. Now that I look back, it amazes me that I did as well as I did in school.

The problem (of course) with personal flow charts is that no matter how complicated or uncomplicated they might be, they don’t tell any stories. Take away the narrative, and you have a dead body with no spine.

Yeah, so it rained today. The horses did not get exercise. I sorted books and then I distributed books. On the return trip I crossed paths with Pete who was in his vehicle heading in the direction of Buffalo Mine Road. I was done for the day, so we returned home and I then went with him to town.

We picked up four newspaper boxes at the Frontiersman Newspaper office and a few copies of Valley Living, the local news magazine. Jacob Mann, who covers our beat, wrote a nice story about us. The pictures also complement the article.

We next went and visited Milena who is now the Executive Director of Kid’s Kupboard, a nonprofit that distributes food to children in need. She gave us a tour and showed us the freezers that contain the food, this includes the animals that were sold as market livestock at the fair. I touched the frozen carcass of a turkey and wondered, do we humans really need to be carnivores?

We also picked up some books that had ended up there. Slowly, we are consolidating our books, and getting those books that we’d taken elsewhere to the hotel.

We made a beeline for the hotel after leaving Kid’s Kupboard. Now there are two newspaper boxes there. And I put the incoming books on the long table.

It stopped raining on the return trip home, but by then it was too late to go for a horseback ride. Instead, I took the dogs for a walk around the loop. Sad to say, there are now two more lose dogs on the upper road – making for six altogether. And so the days of my taking goats for a walk are over.

The sun is supposed to shine tomorrow. But tomorrow is the day on which I have to go to town.

Next: 271. 10/3/23: What’s not forgotten is easily Remembered